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Pale, Male and Stale

The gender bias at the top of the judiciary must be redressed but appointing more women is not the whole answer

November 14 2011, 12:01am, The Times

“A woman cannot be herself in the society of the present day, which is an exclusively masculine society, with laws framed by men and with a judicial system that judges feminine conduct from a masculine point of view.” So wrote Henrik Ibsen in 1879. As relates to modern Britain, the sentiment is not quite right. But it could, and should, be a lot more wrong.

There is only one woman judge in the Supreme Court. In the Court of Appeal, out of 37 judges, there are four. The High Court is hardly better. In both Australia and Canada women account for over a third of the top level of the judiciary. There are parts of the world, certainly, which fare worse, but they are not…